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South Africa has been batting the ball out of the park at the 2023 Cricket World Cup hosted in India. 🏏🔥

The competition is scheduled to conclude on 19 November 2023 and already the Proteas have the highest run rate of any team in the tournament and the two highest scores in the competition so far. Wisden has listed every batting record broken by South Africa at the 2023 World Cup so far.

In their very first game of the competition, the Proteas went all out and scored the highest total in the history of men’s cricket competitions. They racked up a crazy 428-5 against Sri Lanka, with Quinton de Kock, Rassie van der Dussen, and Aiden Markram all hitting centuries. Markram even zoomed to the fastest century ever in the tournament, clocking in at just 49 balls. But hey, Glenn Maxwell decided to one-up him less than three weeks later against the Netherlands at the same venue.

South Africa isn’t stopping there – they also nailed the fifth-highest score in the tournament’s history, putting up a whopping 399-7 against England at the Wankhede. Heinrich Klaasen even pulled off a 61-ball hundred in that game, which is the eighth fastest in World Cup history.

When they smacked New Zealand with a 190-run victory in Pune, South Africa went beyond England’s 2019 World Cup record for the most sixes in a single edition. They’ve already blasted 82 sixes, and there are still two more group-stage matches to go.

Now, here’s the kicker – if South Africa makes it to the semi-finals, they have a shot at becoming the highest-scoring team ever in a single World Cup edition. They’ve already piled up 2,355 runs from seven games, and the current record holder is England from 2019 with 3,183 runs. Just 828 more runs, and they’ll be on top. Plus, their eight individual hundreds are a record in a single World Cup. Talk about setting the bar high.

Their team’s run rate is off the charts at 6.92, making it the highest ever in a single edition, even beating their record from 2015.

On an individual level, De Kock is rocking it, too. He’s now tied with Kumar Sangakkara in second place for the most centuries (4) scored by a batter in a single edition of the tournament. And the excitement doesn’t stop there – he’s in sixth place on the list for the most sixes hit in a single edition with 18, aiming for Chris Gayle’s leading 26 from 2015.

De Kock is also chasing Sachin Tendulkar’s record for the most runs hit in a single edition, with 545 runs under his belt and Tendulkar’s record at 673 from the 2003 tournament well within reach.

It’s like watching a cricket legend in the making.

[source:wisden]